1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and system for updating data described in the extensible markup language (XML) and stored in a server such as a world wide web server (WWW server).
2. Description of the Prior Art
The XML data are updated conventionally as follows in network systems including the WWW server and the clients.
First, the client requests an XML data, and the server transfers the XML data to be updated through a network. Then, the client updates the XML data and transmits the updated XML data. Here, the client updates the XML data, by using such programs as a XML Perser for transforming the XML data into document object model (DOM) object, an application program for updating the DOM object and a program for transforming the updated DOM object into the XML data. Finally, the server replaces the original XML data by the updated XML data.
However, the above-mentioned prior art has the following disadvantages.
First, transmitted data quantity becomes large, because all the original XML data are transferred to the client and all the updated XML data are transferred to the server. Further, it takes much time for the client to update the original XML data, because the client must transform the original XML data into the DOM object, by using hardware poor than that of the server.
Further, the client should be equipped with additional memory capacity for the program for transforming the XML data into the DOM object.